Our wildlife garden

By Karen Baker from Horsham

We bought our old house with a large garden over twenty years ago and spent the first few years renovating our home and working long hours to pay for it! Here’s how we’ve encouraged a range of wildlife, including pollinators, into our patch over time.

Friendship garden

At first, I only had time to keep the front garden tidy. There is a large flower bed which I started to fill with my favourite blue and purple flowers and called it the ‘Purple Bed’. Friends and family knew this and bought me plants to add. They also offered plants from their own gardens and these have been the most successful.

One friend in particular shared my love of nature and wanted me to take lots of wildlife-friendly plants from her garden as she was seriously ill and needed to know they were cared for. I realised how special gardens are for keeping memories of friends and family, and renamed this part of the garden our ‘Friendship Garden’.

It has developed into a random cottage garden which bees and butterflies love. Their favourites are pulmonaria (from my Granny’s garden), allium, hardy geraniums, aquilegia, purple (and pink) toadflax, red valerian, verbena bonariensis, scabious, and Japanese anemones.

Driveway

Our driveway has its own character. The old fence is covered in lichens and rambling plants including honeysuckle and wild roses. There are also my family heirloom rambling roses: cuttings my parents gave me that originally grew in my grandparents’ garden. More special memories.

There are also quirky garden additions here created by my artistic husband. Planters made from old air compressors, racing tyres filled with plants, a firepit created from gas bottles and made to look like my old Chevy truck, and a gate from engine camshafts. He has made tables and benches for friends as well as us. Like our parents, we have always reused everything – long before “upcycling” became trendy!

Wild Garden

The rest of the garden was left untended for many years and we realised the benefits of this as wildlife came into it from the woodland behind. Gradually we have added features to make this area even more attractive to all creatures.

We started by building a raised deck so we can sit and enjoy time with our visitors both human and animal! The garden slopes down from here. The first part is full of cottage plants that friends gave us – usually as they were too ‘invasive’ for their more formal gardens. Not a problem here as the more the merrier and they mingle with wildflowers that self-seed.

A couple of years ago, we finally created a wildlife pond within view of the deck. This year dragonflies emerged from the pond for the first time. We hope to attract frogs, toads and even newts. We seeded the bank with more cottage and wildflower seeds. This was a riot of colour last year and a stunning mass of wild daisies this year. I will gradually add native perennial plants grown from seed so it will be a colourful display and continue to attract diverse pollinators.

Next there is a row of mature apple trees providing food at every stage from blossom to harvest. I pick a few apples but leave windfalls for wildlife. Roe deer are regular visitors here – last year a young buck came every day. He would doze there for a while and then stagger away – we think he got drunk eating old apples turning themselves into cider!

Really wild garden

Beyond the orchard the garden gets progressively wilder. I encourage the taller plants there including teasels, ragwort, willowherb, evening primrose, grasses, buddleia and a large patch of stinging nettles. Mature ivy rampages over fallen dead trees – buzzing with life in late summer as it flowers. There are piles of old logs, stones, tiles and compost heaps providing homes for many small creatures.

An overgrown hazel hedge turns the last narrow part of our garden into a woodland edge. Primroses, snowdrops and a few English bluebells grow there and in summer it becomes a jungle of tall bracken. A narrow path through here leads to beautiful bluebell woods (sadly not our own).

Feeling inspired by Karen’s amazing wildlife garden? Check out our Bee the change campaign to discover simple actions you can take in your outdoor space to support a range of wildlife including pollinators, birds, and hedgehogs! There are FREE resources to download and a limited number of postal packs also available.